Safe attachment



(No Mode.)

` A, OBERNDORF, J1.

,SAFE ATTACHMENT.

No. 563,681. Patented July?, 1896.

A TTOHNEYS.

1m: norms PETERS co, Pnuymwm WASHINGTON, n. c.

UNITED STATES ATENT il' FFlCEtV SAFE ATTACHMENT.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 563,681, dated July '7, 1896.

Application tiled April 13, 1896. Serial No. 5 87,339. (No model.)

To all whont t may concern:

Beit known that I, ABRAHAM OBERNDORF, Jr. of Ceutralia,in the county of Nemaha and State of Kansas, have invented a new and useful Improvement in B urglar-Proof Attachments for Safes, die. of which the following is a specification.

In an application for a patent filed by me October 23, 1895, Serial No. 566,588, allowed January 14, 1896, I have shown and described a device in the nature of a portable attachment which when. placed in a safe, vault, or strong room will, in the event of an attempt by burglars to blow open the same, cause the generation oi' a stifling and poisonous gas, which will make it impossible for the burglar to live in the fumes of the same, and thus prevent him from making away with the booty. That device comprehended a broad fanlike trigger, which l call a pneumatic trigger, which is acted upon by the concussion of the blast to trip a hammer and allow its descent `from a spring to fracture a bottle containing the ingredients of the poison vapors.

My present invention proceeds upon the same general principle and comprises certain peculiar improvements of the parts in detail, as will be hereinafter more -fully described with reference to the drawings, and then pointed out in the claims.

Figure l is a side view, partly in section.'

Fig. 2 is a sectional edge view, and Fig. 3 is a sectional side view, of the bottle holder and cage.

In the drawings, A represents the iframeplaie, which is designed to be hung up or detachably fastened Within the safe or vault, "for which purpose a ring or loop A' may be used, or screws passing through holes a may be employed. On this plate is attached a marginal inclosing flange B, which with a detachable grating B over its open side forms a housing for a pneumatic trigger C. This pneumatic trigger is in the nature of a fanblade corresponding in shape to the upper part of the housing, and lying within the same immediately behind the grating B', being sustained upon a pivotal axis at c c and held to the front parallel with the grating by a ilat spring C' behind it. To the fan-blade of this trigger is rigidly attached. an arm D,

extending laterally and having a pin e, playing in a recess B2 of a right-angular trippingslide E. This slide passes through the side of the case and has its right-angular end extended. past the free ends of pawl-levers N, whose other ends engage notches in the hammers K. These hammers are fulerumed at 7.: to a cage J and are actuated by springs K', but are held cocked, when the device is set, by the pawls N, which are forced by springs e' into the notches of the hammers. The case J is composed of parallel rods j, connected and supported at their ends by plates Z and m. The plate Z is provided with one or more cartridge chambers Z', adapted to receive metal ball-cartridges Z2, which' rest immediately beneath the points of the hammers, and which hammers when they fall thereupon eX- plode the cartridges and drive the bullets into th e` glass tube, bottle, or receptacle I for the liquid or liquids or other substances that generate the gas. These bottles or tubes are inserted into the cage through a laterallyswinging frame m and are retained therein by aclasp mi, which with the frame 'm' may be turned aside, as shown in dotted lines in Fig. 2, to admit the bottles, or be turned over the bottles so as to retain them in the cage. The hinged frame m is closed by the tension of a spiral spring m3 Wound about its axial rod m5, and the ends of said rod are extended and Work in sliding blocks m4, which slide in slots in the two end plates, so as to accommodate larger bottles or a greater number of them.

S is a detachable saictyplate, which is adapted to enter the space between the hammers and the end plate and occupy a position beneath the hammers, so that the latter cannot fall upon the cartridges. This safetyplate is inserted from either the front or sides during the hours of business, when the safe is open, so that the cartridges cannot be accidentally exploded by those legitimately using the safe. XVhen the safe is closed for the night, this safety-plate is removed. To prevent damage to the sharp points of the hammers that explode the cartridges, holes h are formed in the said plate to receive said points.

The opera-tion of my invention is as fol lows: Assuming that the safe or vault has been closed for the night and the device is set up therein in operative position, if any attempt to blow open the safe is perpetrated the concussion of the blast, operating upon the fan of the pneumatic triggerC, deflects the latter on its pivots c c against the spring C', and slide E is pushed forward by arm D, and the pawls N that hold the hammers against the tension of the springs K being removed from the notches of the hammers the springs K force the hammers down upon the cartridges with an exploding blow, and the cartridges are made to drive their bullets into the glass bottles, crashing them, spilling or mixing and scattering their contents and allowing the poisonous gas to be generated and to ll the safe or vault, so that a continuation of his operations would mean death or insensibility to the burglar. To allow the liquids to pass freely through the plate m, the latter is preferably made perforated.

With the abovedescribed device it is practical to so fill the safe, vault, or strong room with a poisonous gas, which shall pervade the place for so long a time as to utterly frustrate a continuance of the burglary and prevent the loss of the valuable contents of the safe.

The device is very simple and practical, and is so universal in its application as to permit it to be applied to any safe, vault, or strong room already in use, no matter what its con struction is, and herein lies a great point of advantage over other devices operating upon this general principle which require to be built in with and made a part of the construction of the safe or vault.

Having thus described my invention, what l claim as new, and desire to secure by Letters Patent, is

1. In a burglar-proof attachment for safes &c. the combination with the exploding-hammer, its spring-retaining pawl and trigger, of a cage for the frangible bottles having one side made in the form of a hinged door-frame and a spring for holding it closed substantially as and for the purpose described.

2. In a burglar-proof attachment for safes &c. the combination with the exploding-hammer, its spring-retaining pawl and trigger, of a cage for the frangible bottle having one side made in the form of hinged door-frame, a spring for holding it closed, and adjustable bearings for the axis of said door-frame to accommodate different sizes or a large number of bottles substantially as described.

3. In a burglar-proof attachment for safes (Snc. the combination with the exploding-hammer, its spring-retaining pawl and trigger, of a cage for the frangible bottle7 a hinged door, having an axis parallel to the cage and provided with a spiral spring and a clasparm extension at the edge of the door substantially as and for the purpose described.

4. In a burglar-proof attachment for safes dac., the combination with the cage for the frangible-bottlebearing cartridge-seats and the hammers for exploding the cartridges, of a flat detachable plate arranged beneath the hammers and having holes or recesses to receive the points of the hammers substantially as and for the purpose described.

5. In a burglar-proof attachment for safes &c., the combination with the cage for the frangible bottles, of ahammer pivoted to the same and having an actuating-spring and a retaining-notch, a spring pawl-lever engaging with said notch, a sliding tripping device for acting upon the end of and releasing the pawllever, and a pneumatic trigger with an arm operating upon the slide substantially as and for the purpose described.

ABRAHAM OBERNDORF, JR.

lVitnesses:

A. HARBURGER, M. CooK. 

